The goal of the Artist Collective is to strengthen the careers of independent music artists who are releasing their own cd's and merch without the assistance of labels (or on small labels who want to participate!), and don't have exclusive distribution deals in place.
How do we plan on doing this? Mainly by offering a world-wide mail-order sales & distribution service that allows your cd's to be sold alongside bigger-label releases whilst becoming publicized via direct marketing to over 1500 FW Music Store subscribers and that number is rising steadily.
On top of the mail-order sales, basic newsletter promortions, and digital download deals offered, the FW Music Store Artist Collective partnerships also allow for the facilitation of other paid-services, like product manufacturing, PR services in several countries, and possible traditional physical-product distribution to stores in some territories, as well as film & TV licencing; all these opportunities can be discussed on a project-by-project basis.
"The soul of the FW Music Store is the networking opportunities it provides via its online community of subscribers, as well as the access to the Fading Ways street-teams of independent music fans around the world. If you are an artist putting out your own records, you can gain access to a ready-made independent-friendly fanbase, with the understanding that you too will do as much as possible to spread the word on the FW Music Store in order to further increase the numbers of our community of music fans. Sales achievements depend as much on you putting the word out as it does on FW's own efforts, and those of all the other artists involved in the Collective. Together, as an independent community, we have the opportunity to change the world. Er.. or at least the music business as we know it!" - Neil Leyton, July 2006.
